Where I live, usually 8 first responders show up: The firetruck driver, his navigator, the guy who holds the map, the guy who lifts the coffee cup up for the navigator, the air conditioning switch monitor, the backseat driver, the trauma psychologist, and one paramedic.

I’ve seen two rescue trucks, a full on fire engine hook and ladder, a paramedic truck with crew and two cops show up when an old lady fell in her kitchen...There had to be 8 or 9 people standing around for 25 minutes...

Based on the response, you’d think an aircraft crashed in the neighborhood.

8
posted on 04/10/2013 5:05:38 PM PDT
by dragnet2
(Diversion and evasion are tools of deceit)

Oh I see, so it takes a hook and ladder truck with full crew, a couple of rescue trucks with crews, paramedics and the typical cop car that shows up, because they’re afraid the old lady weigh 400 pounds?

Yuk yuk...

What a knee slapper!

Bet the rent it has something to do with their unions.

14
posted on 04/10/2013 5:16:54 PM PDT
by dragnet2
(Diversion and evasion are tools of deceit)

SUWANEE, Ga. - Authorities say that a hostage situation involving Gwinnett County firefighters has ended with the suspect dead and a SWAT officer injured.

Cpl. Edwin Ritter of the Gwinnett County Police Department said that the suspect was killed after the SWAT team entered into the home to end the four-hour hostage situation around 7:30 p.m.

Authorities did not say if the suspect died of a self-inflicted wound or if he was shot by officers.

An officer apparently suffered a gunshot wound to his arm or hand, Ritter said. His injuries are said to be non-life-threatening.

The four firefighters being held hostage suffered superficial injuries when a flash bang off, according to Ritter. They will be able to go home to their families on Wednesday night, Ritter said.

Police say that the incident began after firefighters responded to a home in the 2400 block of Walnut Grove Way in Suwanee after the suspect made a heart attack call around 3:40 p.m.

“They arrived at the scene. They went in and began to do what they do every day when they were taken hostage,” said Captain Tommy Rutledge of the Gwinnett County Fire Department.

Ritter said that the suspect was apparently suffering financial difficulties and was demanding to have his power and other utilities turned back on. The Associated Press reports that public records show that the home where the situation took place is in foreclosure and has been bank-owned since mid-November.

There were originally five hostages, but one firefighter was let go to move the fire truck, according to Rutledge.

That home is near Collins Hill Park, Walnut Grove Elementary School and Collins Hill High School. Those schools are closed this week for spring break.

Residents were not being allowed into the neighborhood while the incident was ongoing, according to authorities.

Authorities had asked media not to send any helicopters into the airspace of the SWAT call.

Stay with FOX 5 and myfoxatlanta.com for more details on this breaking news story.

17
posted on 04/10/2013 5:22:19 PM PDT
by Wisconsinlady
(When will the rest of America's citizens wake up to the Obamanation?)

Heard this lady call a radio station, her 88 year old husband tripped over their Chihuahua, fell and couldn’t get up....Entire fleets of rescue vehicles show up, they transport him 1.2 miles to the local medical mill and they charged her $1,295 just for the trip to the hospital...Nothing else..

She was doing the big chicken on the phone...Another unhappy camper...

18
posted on 04/10/2013 5:26:06 PM PDT
by dragnet2
(Diversion and evasion are tools of deceit)

Ya see it all the time...Like when 16 male cops jump on some lumberhead, with punches flying and ya see butch dancing around the outside of the dog pile, attempting to kick the lumberhead when she can find an open spot. When it’s all done and said, they let butch walk the lumberhead, who is now beatup, shackled and cuffed, to the cop car as if she got her man...

It’s hilarious watching this stuff...Comedy gold

22
posted on 04/10/2013 5:38:18 PM PDT
by dragnet2
(Diversion and evasion are tools of deceit)

They went in and began to do what they do every day when they were taken hostage

It sounds as if they get taken hostage pretty often. Nice writing. Colleen Jenkins and David Beasley; Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Steve Orlofsky. Four people and they still can't make it sound right. High school interns?

23
posted on 04/10/2013 5:39:34 PM PDT
by Right Wing Assault
(Dick Obama is more inexperienced now than he was before he was elected.)

It's usually 2 FF’s where I live, unless there are multiple people injured, the ever increasing 400 plus pounders, or those having seizures or other disorders that tend to “fight back” even though it's not their fault. Oh and the druggies that are freaking out with super human strength that have to be subdued.

Also, if you've got 5 available back at the firehouse and not sure what you're getting into, why not bring them along? They can respond to other calls from anywhere within a city.

In LA, and many other cities, you get these typical minor fender benders, with the occupant of one vehicle claiming some concocted BS injury and entire teams and fleets with full crews of government rescue personnel roll on the call.

There is absolutely no guessing as to why our taxes are sky high absurd.

26
posted on 04/10/2013 5:49:24 PM PDT
by dragnet2
(Diversion and evasion are tools of deceit)

That $1295 was probably just for the ambulance. My mom (rest her soul) was transported to the hospital ($1500) sent back to her nursing home ($1500 or we drive her, we drove her) next they realize she was way to sick to leave the hospital, transferred back ($1500) and passed away a few days later.

Oh, and Paramedics on the ambulance make about $12.00/hr. My mother did not use any advanced care on the ambulance, they gave her some oxygen one time.

Where I live, usually 8 first responders show up: The firetruck driver, his navigator, the guy who holds the map, the guy who lifts the coffee cup up for the navigator, the air conditioning switch monitor, the backseat driver, the trauma psychologist, and one paramedic.

I find your comment to be disgusting and evasive. OISA is absolutely correct...Ya think him, me and others on here are the only one's who've noticed massive responses to very typical minor events? Ya see this all the time. This is now secret.

Most jobs in the real world ya either do your job with few or no staff/co-workers, or you find another job.

Based on the fact ya got cops/fire department personnel and other city/county government employees retiring in their 50s, while collecting 75K+++ in government lottery pensions and top shelf benefits for life! Well...

This has becoming a real hot button issue as it should, since many cities and counties are breaking the tax payers and their own pension funds...

You don't like people telling the brutal truth?

Too damn bad.

32
posted on 04/10/2013 7:52:29 PM PDT
by dragnet2
(Diversion and evasion are tools of deceit)

You don't understand the training necessary and the stress involved in preforming that job. As far as how many people respond to an emergency there is a national standard which must be met and many times a Fire Unit can be there faster than a Med Unit. The same quality of care is provided by an Engine Co. but with no means of transport.

Many times people think Fire Personal just sit around the firehouse waiting on the next call and with a good fire service such as in Gwinnett County nothing could be further from the truth. Training is ongoing and evolving, many of the personal have BS degrees or Master degrees and could make much better pay in the private sector but this was their calling, to help others.

In an emergency situation minutes may seem like hours when in reality most calls have a response time of seven minutes or less.

33
posted on 04/10/2013 7:57:57 PM PDT
by Aquamarine
(To show His love, Jesus died for us; to show our love, we live for Him.)

There is no need to go further with this Ms. Auqua...Your comments above pretty much provide explain your motives for such comments.

Listen, this might be breaking news to you, but most private sector Americans nowadays, who are capable of critical thought, are not too happy about the massive bloated, budget killing unionized government class workers, at all levels...

Based on your comments, continuing this conversation is probably not in your best interest.

Take care Ms.

40
posted on 04/10/2013 9:08:25 PM PDT
by dragnet2
(Diversion and evasion are tools of deceit)

This state is a right to work state not supported by the unions. Pensions are paid into by the individual much like your 401K as is the medical. None of this has anything to do with what was going on with the Fireman hostages. I hope you never need one of these people that you hold in so much contempt.

41
posted on 04/10/2013 9:09:32 PM PDT
by Aquamarine
(To show His love, Jesus died for us; to show our love, we live for Him.)

You deny tens of millions of unionized government workers, including water and power, fire personnel, cops, city councils, their staffs, accountants, planners, etc and their bloated government salaries, pension and benefits are not choking off privater sector America?

You deny this?

42
posted on 04/10/2013 9:15:19 PM PDT
by dragnet2
(Diversion and evasion are tools of deceit)

BS Degrees, Masters Degrees......AND........ they only work about 9-11 days a month.

And yes, they do spend a fair amount of time laying around the firehouse. As I remember, shift starts around 7 or 8am - you have to be doing something related to work until around 5pm - then from 5-9pm you have your free time - after 9pm you can go to bed and shift is over in the morning. Then you get 2 days off.

Free time is when all the firemen go to their vehicles, get their laptops, etc and start scheduling what they’ll be doing on their off-days, IE plumbers, carpenters, electricians, landscaping, pressure washing, moonlight as firemen/emt’s at other fire departments. That’s the joy of being a firemen, you can have another full time job.

As for the pensions you speak of, yes they contribute but the municipality contributes the majority of the money.

So, do I feel bad for the firemen that were taken hostage.

But right about now, all those firemen that used to think the cops don’t do s**t, have a different perspective on their fellow civil servants up there in Gwinnett County.

I live in Cobb county Miss Aquamarine. I have a damn fine friend that just retired from Fulton county Fire. My dad went to school with the longtime chief of Cobb...Roy Hamrick.

Unlike most states...Our FF aren’t paid much...most have to work another job on their 24 hours off just to pay their bills. They pay into a private 401 K...just like everyone else.

During the epic..biblical 2009 flood here in Cobb county...Our FF’s went far ABOVE the CALL OF DUTY...risking their asses braving the cottonmouths...swarming balls of fire ants...and raging ass current..saving untold numbers of lives versus the 10 we lost. One rescue I watched the young boy FF...couldn’t have been more than 19...saved a woman from her car that had been washed off a bridge and pinned undercarriage against a tree...rushed out the truck before a line could be unrolled and DOVE into a raging 15 knot mass of ugly...barely catching himself on the car..IN THE DARK...HAD HE MISSED THE CAR THE FREAKIN CHATTAHOOCHIE RIVER WAS TWO BENDS DOWNSTREAM...30 FREAKIN FEET ABOVE FLOOD STAGE AND 55 degrees of twenty knot current...He woulda been dead before he got to Douglas county and woulda washed all the way to West Point lake...90 miles downstream.

I ain’t heard of any those folks like her....or the hundreds like her...getting any extra bill. Nor would I think they would give a f#ck.

I wonder if that crane operator rescued from his 200 ft tall perch....from the raging inferno of burning 15 story building beneath him...by that young ass Atlanta FF DANGLING FROM A HELO by what was pretty much a leather swing set seat and NO GODDAMN HARNESS....I wonder if he got billed extra? I’m sure the FF got a damn dime extra and did not give a f#ck...ain’t NO AMOUNT OF MONEY WORTH LAYIN OUT A SACK THAT SIZE....IT WAS DONE OUT OF LOVE FOR HIS FELLOW MAN.

I know that in my younger days....when I did some steel erecting downtown....it paid no more to be feet on the ground or dangling 20 stories up on a beam being hoisted in place and bolted...with that NW wind blowing hard down the Appalachains.

No amount of Combat pay was worth laying the ass on the line...whether getting shot at in Central and South America...or standing watch on the port side .50 cal during a good blow at night...or working on a live 480 volt panel rolling in 20 ft seas that HAD to be fixed quickly before we hit another ship or the jagged ass rocks the 40 knot plus gale was blowing us toward. No sir.

I wonder if the FF’s...rushing to the top of World trade...when EVERYONE ELSE WAS RUNNING DOWN THEM STEPS....Wonder if their widows think the money they got was worth watching them buildings come down with their loved ones inside...watching them die on national TV....was worth it?

And most importantly....when my wife had a reaction to her new meds and put her hand through our living room window...severing her artery with the smallest of four ugly lacerations....taking three of the 150 + stitches to close. I was around the corner at a neighbors and went running after the ambulance and first engine went by....I beat the squad rescue and chief to my yard...seeing my wife laid out on our deck covered in blood head to toe..looking very dead...the whole gory scene made worse with the splashing red from their lights running a circle...over and over and over.

I’ve seen some really gruesome...f@cked up shit in my life...I will NEVER forget that scene. And had she died...that image would have haunted me hard the rest of my life.

Her first BP was 70/30. There was one EMT trying to sew up the artery...the other was giving the IV with both the fluids and blood clotter that would save her life...One FF was taking her BP and reading it out every 30 seconds. One FF...rated in Advanced Life support EMT was in command barking out orders while another was on the radio with Cobb Gen ER telling THEM WTF was going on.

While the Chief stood right next to me...cool as ice...telling me this is his Ateam and they got this. SHe’s good...that EMT who so skillfully and quickly got the IV going...in the dark...before anyone else got to her....saving her life with his badassness like he did Marines in Afghanistan as a Navy Corpsman. His name was Steven Godsden.

He told me his head dude over there running the show was also a Navy corpsman combat vet...Brad Cummings. The rook of the crew...on the radio with the intern at Cobb..who thought they were all following his orders...was clueless. Another Steve..Steve Culbreath.

The EMT that sewed up her artery..in the dark...doing a better job than the er docs did in perfect light...Brandon Pirkle.

From the time they arrived till she was loaded was just shy of 5 minutes...two minutes later the Chief got the official “She’s good” from EMT Godsden riding in the back of the ambulance with my wife...along with FF Brad...the head dude.

Luckily for us...it was Friday night and the Trauma A team was on duty because Friday is usually a pretty busy night for car wreck trauma.

The only bill I got was from the ambulance company...a PRIVATE company...for $1500. It’s been paid in the year since.

I didn’t get jack squat of a bill from Cobb Fire. They did get a big fat delivery of Wallace BBQ one Friday night later on. Then another they got some deer chili. Another time I took them two gallons of untaxed Apple pie brandy. They got my undying gratitude and prolly tired of hearing my thanks....along with a letter to the head of Public safety in Cobb county.

Now some may bitch about the FF’s in their state. I bitch about bloated government employees myself....sucking up massive amounts of tax money for little in return. But to bitch about FF’s? Those who are the lowest paid amongst government employees but are expected to give the most...their lives...FOR YOU??

BITCH AT THEM WHILE THEY ARE SAVING YOUR LIFE. BE SURE TO BITCH AT THEM WHILE THEY ARE DYING SAVING YOUR UNGRATEFUL ASS...GO ASK THEIR WIDOWS IF THEY ARE ENJOYING THEIR FAT ASS LIVES YOUR TAX DOLLARS ARE PROVIDING THEM.

Go down to Manhattan and tell them how overpaid their dead brothers were...Do it next week so I can watch...you ungrateful bastard.

Seems public pension corruption is also eating the tax payers alive in Georgia.

At the bottom of this, there are two more simple questions for ya.

___________________________________________________

Public pension crisis threatens your wallet

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Public pensions are a rock slide crashing down on local governments, threatening to bury some and alter the landscape of others.

The pension plans of five metro governments are hundreds of millions of dollars in the red. Add in the city of Atlantas gigantic liabilities, and the total pension deficit for the city and five core counties came to $2.8 billion in 2009, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has determined.

The city of Atlanta, for example, raised its pension benefits twice in the 2000s without making provision to pay for those increases.

The result: a $1.3 billion deficit in 2009. DeKalb Countys plan was fully funded 13 years ago, so officials declared a contribution holiday and for several years paid little into the fund. By 2009, DeKalb was running the highest deficit of any of the metro counties

Critics assert that some local leaders have mishandled their pension systems  offering generous benefits that they couldnt actually afford to score political points. The critics point out that the two pension increases in Atlanta were enacted during election years.

Now city and county governments must find more money for pensions at the same time theyre trying to plug budget deficits, leaving them with an array of bad choices: raise taxes, cut services, increase employees contributions to the pension plan or reduce benefits to retirees.

On Jan. 1, DeKalb County police Sgt. Jeff Wiggs and other DeKalb employees saw their contribution to the county pension plan nearly double, to 8.4 percent of their pay.

That caught us completely off guard, and especially the amount, said Wiggs, president of the DeKalb Fraternal Order of Police.

The majority of the department, theyre making $38,000 or $40,000 a year, trying to raise two or three kids. Thats hard to do, Wiggs said.

For the typical DeKalb worker, the increased contribution comes to $1,750 a year, at a time when most county workers havent seen a raise in years.

DeKalbs pension plan costs are jumping this year by more than 50 percent. The pension will suck $47.7 million out of the county budget at the same time DeKalb is facing layoffs, furloughs and the closing of at least one library.

Another $23.5 million will come out of employees paychecks.

Region full of shortfalls

Other local governments face grave problems as well:

● Atlanta  the regions poster child of past pension mismanagement  is now planning the radical step of a hard freeze, which some experts say no government has tried before in Georgia. Without the step, which freezes all employees future pension benefits at todays level, city officials say Atlantas $1.3 billion pension deficit will eventually triple. Its $125 million annual pension bill already consumes more than 20 percent of the citys budget.

● Cobb Countys pension fund in 2009 contained just 55 percent of the money it has promised to retirees  one of the worst cases of underfunding in metro Atlanta. The worst: Atlanta Public Schools, which has funds to cover an abysmal 17 percent of its obligations.

A widely accepted benchmark holds that, at any given time, pension funds should contain at least 80 percent of the money they have promised to pay out.

● Gwinnett County this year increased employees required contributions to as much as 9 percent of their total pay.

Governments in Fulton, Gwinnett and Cobb counties have also taken a page from the private sectors playbook by closing their traditional pension plans to new hires.

The taxpayers cant pay everything, said Virgil Moon, head of Cobbs pension board. Cobb closed its pension plan in 2010, increased employees contributions and set up a cheaper plan for new hires.

__________________________________________________________

Tell me Mr. Vigilant, why should the tax payers be paying for ANY portion of government employee retirements, when those in the private sector are now being told they should be saving for their own retirements. Should the government sector do the same?

Private sector employees are now being told not to expect their employers to pay for their medical benefits. Should the same go for the government sector?

46
posted on 04/11/2013 12:06:03 AM PDT
by dragnet2
(Diversion and evasion are tools of deceit)

Broken Promises: Pensions All Over America Are Being Savagely Cut Or Are Vanishing Completely

How would you feel if you worked for a state or local government for 20 or 30 years only to have your pension slashed dramatically or taken away entirely? Well, this exact scenario is playing out from coast to coast....

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